Renee Kathleen Zellweger

Renee Kathleen Zellweger, was born in Katy, Texas on April 25 in 1969. Her mother Kjellfrid (Andreassen) is a former midwife and nurse from Norway, Kven (Finnish), and also has Swedish and Norwegian descent. Her father, Emil Erich Zellweger, is an engineer born in Switzerland. They were married in the year 1963. Renee has a brother called Drew Zellweger, a marketing executive who was born on February 15 in 1967. While working in the drama club, Renee became interested in acting. She also took an acting class at University of Texas (Austin) which was the first time she looked to pursue a career in acting. After graduating, she wanted to keep acting, however Hollywood isn't an easy town to break into, and so Renee made the decision to stay in Texas and attempted to audition for roles around Houston, where she managed to grab roles in such films such as Reality Bites (1994) and Empire Records (1995). Matthew McConaughey was another Hollywood newcomer she met filming Texas Chainsaw Massacre 2: The Next Generation (1994). He was working on an initiative at the time that Renee was intrigued by. She tried out for, and got the role in the movie Love and a .45 (1994) and earned her enough critical praise that she decided to move to Los Angeles. Then she was offered a role in The Whole Wide World (1996) which was an opportunity to make her debut as a major actress. Cameron Crowe was busy with casting Jerry Maguire (1996) starring Tom Cruise. Crowe was looking into actors like Bridget Fonda (Camden Diaz), Winona Ryder (Winona Ryder) and Marisa Tomei when he discovered Zellweger's performance on The Whole Wide World (1996). He auditioned Zellweger and was certain he had found his Dorothy Boyd. Renee was able to follow her massive success by releasing a couple of independent films and after receiving more praise from critics she was confident enough to return to the realm of large-budget Hollywood films. Meryl Streep appeared alongside her in One True Thing (1998). Also, she acted in Me, Myself & Irene (2000), opposite Jim Carrey, and soon after she began dating Carrey. Bridget Jones's Diary (2001).